BUTTERCREAM ICING

How To Make Buttercream Frosting

Learn how to make buttercream frosting with this easy tutorial. This is the BEST recipe for homemade buttercream, it pipes perfectly, and makes a great base for other frosting flavors too!

Today we’re covering how to make homemade buttercream frosting. Actually, we’re covering just how EASY it is to make your own frosting right at home. If you’ve been buying store-bought frosting, you’ll want to ditch it after seeing just how easy it is to make your own.

The best part? This recipe makes a great base for so many different flavor variations too! So, let’s get started.

You’ll start out with two sticks of unsalted butter softened to room temperature. I use unsalted butter in all of my recipes because the amount of salt in salted butter can vary quite a bit between different brands. By using unsalted butter, you control the amount of salt in your recipe.

You’ll beat the butter with a mixer for about 1 minute, just until it’s nice and smooth.

Next, you’ll mix in your powdered sugar (also known as confectioners sugar or icing sugar). I typically only use about 3 cups of powdered sugar for a batch of this frosting. Some recipes call for quite a bit more powdered sugar, but I’ve found that 3 cups is all you really need. It’s best to sift the powdered sugar beforehand, but if I’m being honest I usually skip the extra step.

When you first start mixing the powdered sugar with the butter, mix it on low speed so you don’t end up throwing it all over the place. Once it starts to come together, you’ll mix in the heavy cream, vanilla extract, and a pinch of salt.

Heavy cream or heavy whipping cream really work best in this recipe. You can use milk, but keep in mind that the frosting won’t be nearly as creamy or hold it’s shape quite as well. I usually just mix the frosting for another minute or so until everything is well combined.

Easy, right? The best thing about this recipe is that you can change it up to make different flavors of frosting. I’ve included 4 different variations below, but keep in mind that you can do so much more with this recipe. A few easy ways to change it up is to add different extracts like mint, almond, lemon, etc. and a little food coloring.

Here’s a few of my favorite cupcake recipes that you can use with this frosting:

Any of these cupcake recipes make an excellent base for this frosting. And the possibilities are really endless once you have a good cupcake and buttercream recipe. This recipe also makes enough to generously frost a batch of 12-14 cupcakes. If you prefer less frosting, you can cut the recipe in half. If I’m frosting a single layer cake, I cut this recipe in half as well.